Vocabulary Usage in Hawaii: Affects of Opportunity for Interaction, Time for Mutual Acculturation, and Similarity of Background on Word Choice

Abstract

In a neighborhood Kaimuki grocery store in Honolulu a young Oriental cashier asl\.ed her customer, "Would you like it in a package?" The customer, daydreaming, asked "What?" The cashier responded, "Would you like it in a bag?" The customer, a speech-communication major and a four year resident of Hawaii, wanted to reassure the cashier that she understood her meaning of the word package. However, if the same question had been asked of the customer upon her arrival in the is1ands she vrould not have understood, and the cashier's substitution of the more standard term bag indicated that she thought the customer, possibly a mainland Haole*·, vrou1d not knovl her meaning of the word package. This exchange is an excellent illustration of the differences in American Eng1:lsh dialect which exist in Hawaii and the difficulties in communication vrhich can result because of these differences.